I'll be at Houghton and the freeway @ 08:30

Change in plans.

Training in the morning and Whetstones in the aftyernoon.
Leave my house at 0715,for the training hill.
Meet at the Whetstones in the afternoon, for the glass off.

Eric

I met Eric Smith and Dave Bishop at the Whetstones LZ. It was blowing briskly, but west, and we waffled around for a while trying to figure out whether to invest in the hike to launch or drive over to Box Canyon.

In the end we elected to hike up the Whetstones, so with Dave's help we got Eric's and my gliders to launch and set up to fly.

Eric went first at around 3:15 into a nice, straight-in cycle and immediately climbed out. I followed 30 minutes later into a somewhat weaker, west cycle, but after a few passes managed to climb gradually over the peaks.

Eric later reported it was kind of ratty and turbulent at first, but by the time I got there it was smoothing out. We had a period of time where a bunch of thermals came through. Eric got to 11000 MSL (5000 over launch) and I got to 10500, way back by the Red and Gray Peaks. I thought briefly that we might make it over the back, just another 1500 or so, but it was not to be. The lift shut down abruptly and we both ran back for the front in 1000 down sink.

We spent the rest of the flight in glass-smooth ridge lift around 7500-8000. After an hour in the air I headed out for the LZ, and stunk up the place with a poor landing when a pretty strong gust popped me up on final approach and then left me hanging there with almost no airspeed. Oops. I proned back out and pulled in hard, just got flying again before bouncing my chest on the ground. That was embarrasing, but no damage to wing or pilot.

Eric had a typically perfect landing a few minuts later, and we got packed up just as the sun dipped behind Mt. Wrightson.

A great day of flying.

I did the PG thing at Brace mountain today (Sunday) (near the corner of MA, CT, NY).
A magificent sunny day. High in the upper 60's, nice breeze on launch. Trees at their peak. It was high pressure so you needed to work the little light thermals. I only got 1/2 hour of airtime, but it seemed like much more as I was working the whole time. Flights like this are often some of the most fun and rewarding. There were probably 30 other pilots out at Brace mountain today.

Here are some photos:
http://picasaweb.google.com/morey000/Fl ... ageAtBrace


you're right eric (below). They're not the best photos of the place. There are ones in my 'album' that I took this summer that are better.

<IMG SRC="http://www.sahga.com/forum/album_page.php?pic_id=437">

Glad you got a flight Morey. nice folage.
The flying site photos were ok.
I liked the ones with your daughter,reminded me of when mine were younger.

Thanks for sharing.

Eric